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Urban Shocker's Neighbourhood Watch

Nice to meet you Tony.

What did you think of the evening?

For me, the first thing was dreadful - music about music that slithered all over the place, only briefly modulated in the midsection. I don't mind not arriving at a destination as long as the journey is worth taking. I got the impression that the person who wrote the program notes couldn't find anything nice to say about it either. Had a nice chat to Wayne Gooding of Opera Canada at the inteermission about this.

I drifted in and out of the Mahler and didn't make enough of an emotional connection to it to carry me through, so it mostly impressed me as a technical exercise. I'm actually not that much of a Mahler man; I think there's a good reason why the Adagietto is the only part of the 5th most people have ever heard. Heresy, I know ...
 
Great meeting you, US.

For me the evening was overall really terrific. So sorry I didn't get a chance to chat more but I've got a half-dozen concertgoing friends whom I owed some time during intermission.

I didn't like the Magnus Lindberg piece, to me it was lots of banging and crashing and that's about it. I went for the Mahler and I was hugely rewarded, it was one of the best Mahler efforts I've ever heard, here or anywhere. And that sound carried up extremely well to the second balcony. I really felt that piece.

I am a Mahler fan and also I love the TSO quite dearly. In fact, I prefer symphony going to the opera--by some margin, actually

We'll meet and chat more.

My partner and I are leaving for a week in the sun tomorrow, much needed vacation; I will be nowhere near the web! Have a great week.
 
Understudy Yannick Muriel Noah had her diva moment last Saturday when she replaced the ailing Sumegi. Prolonged and rapturous applause after Vissi d'arte and a standing ovation at the end of the evening.

However, Agafonov's voice was everywhere it shouldn't have been in his big third act aria, which was greeted with stony silence.

At the TSO, Yundi Li was a thriller last night, with Yannick conducting the backup band. In the second half, the Dvorak 6th was as good as it could be, especially the third movement, though I don't think it can ever be as good as the 9th or 8th whoever's steering.
 
Urban Shocker said:
Understudy Yannick Muriel Noah had her diva moment last Saturday when she replaced the ailing Sumegi. Prolonged and rapturous applause after Vissi d'arte and a standing ovation at the end of the evening.

However, Agafonov's voice was everywhere it shouldn't have been in his big third act aria, which was greeted with stony silence.
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She was very good. This is how stars are born, and she took her opportunity and ran with it. After being a bit flat in the first act, she definitely improved as the night progressed. Vissi d'arte was beatiful.

Aganafonov was doing fine until that final aria.. it was stank. There was something off about the whole act.

Noah and Aganafonov had zero chemistry, which was unfortunate (but understandable) since the relationship between Mario and Tosca is pretty much the heart of the Opera. "Tosca, I love you. Now come here and give me a big hug". The hugs were just terrible.

At the TSO, Yundi Li was a thriller last night, with Yannick conducting the backup band. In the second half, the Dvorak 6th was as good as it could be, especially the third movement, though I don't think it can ever be as good as the 9th or 8th whoever's steering.
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A lot of the casual fans hated Prokofiev's 2nd PC because it's not very accessible. However, I think it's such a marvellously dark and brilliant piece, and Yundi Li just dominated it. Yannick had the TSO sounded pretty tight as well; he really impressed me.
 
I never miss Yannick when he's in town. The St. Matthew Passion he conducted last Friday was magnificent. He accompanied Alexander Dobson, who sang Jesus last Friday, at a recital of Die Winterreise at Haliconian Hall last winter that was a gem.

When I bought my TSO subscription a year ago the Prokofiev was promised as Tchaikovsky's 1st piano concerto. I wonder what happened?
 
I checked out Peter Oundjian's performance of Shostakovich's 7th (Leningrad) Symphony with the TSO last week. It was an over-the-top excellent performance. On the same bill an amazingly accomplished and very young Dutch violinist, Janine Jansen, performed the Britten violin concerto. I have never (ever) heard better backing for a concerto than this effort; there was a whole lot of feeling emanating from the stage. After several years' deliberation I am beginning to realize that Oundjian is a marvellous conductor whose principal strength lies in British repertoire and some of the huge complex scores, like those Shostakovich.

Last night an evil friend took me to see As You Like It by the Soulpepper gang. Well worth it, go, I say, go to catch it. I am returning the favour by taking same evil friend to hear Mahler 4th at TSO (Oundjian) tonight. I will file a report on that if you wish.

Be well, all.
 
Welcome back, Tony. Looking forward to your review!

Yes, Jansen is brilliant. She did Shostakovich's Second Violin Concerto with the TSO in 2006, and Maxim Vengerov performed the more popular First on the same programme. Quite the evening.

The best I've heard Oundjian conduct was for a Vaughan-Williams symphony a few years ago, and I agree that he's strongest with the British repertoire.

My next concerts:

* Elijah at the Weston on March 29th.

* COC's Onegin on April 12th.

* COC's Barber of Seville on April 19th

* TSO - Yo Yo Ma on May 3rd.

* TSO Herbig conducts on May 7th.

* COC Pelleas et Melisande on May 17th.

* TSO - Yannick! Brahms 4th on May 29th.

Then we hit Luminato, but I have no idea what's happening there ...
 
The Benjamin Britten / Mahler performance by the Toronto Symphony on March 12 was really a very beautiful and thought-inspiring concert. Both works featured a wonderful Toronto-educated soprano, Barbara Hannigan.

I've lost (or misplaced) my copy of the program notes, so I'm short on specifics about the Britten work (Les Illuminations). I can say that Britten set some fairly homoerotic works of a French poet to music very effectively, and Oundjian and the strings backed the singer just perfectly. The singer made the very most of the lyrics.

The Mahler 4th was very, very special. I have heard Germanic versions of this piece and I've heard European orchestras conducted by Italian conductors do this piece, and I think Oundjian's interpretation leaned toward the latter, or somewhere in between. Being a tad of a Mahlerian myself I can say that this is a very difficult work to get right, and Oundjian got it right. It may be Mahler's one "easy listening" symphony but that doesn't mean it is easily realized.

The TSO took this performance to Detroit on Friday and the Detroit critics praised the orchestra, and conductor, hugely.

The Toronto performance was marred by the presence of Tom Allen onstage. He prattled. And prattled. And prattled some more. Chit-chat about the music and the composers, about 15 minutes too much of chit-chat. I don't want that ever again, and I will write the TSO and tell them that. The music speaks for itself.
 
I wake up five mornings a week with Tom Allen beside me.

CBC Radio 2 are dispensing with much of their "classical" music coverage, so Allen will be a gonner soon. There's going to be a sweet little Radio 2 ghetto for "classical" music at midday, when most of us are at work, though. Russell Smith did a great column about it a couple of days ago - pointing out what we already knew, that what is dismissed as "classical" is actually the most innovative music of all.

Glad you enjoyed the Britten. I listened to most of the Peter Grimes Met broadcast on Saturday afternoon. I hope to go to the rebroadcast of the live simulcast, assuming they're doing one, at Scotiabank theatre sometime.

Later Saturday night I went to a wild disco-dance party in Rosedale - where I met our esteemed colleague and immoderate moderator interchange 44 ( ooops! 42 ) of all people.

On Sunday night I killed a mouse ( eek!:eek: ) which I saw running around in my kitchen. Heavy duty Easy Off spray oven cleaner was the only thing that came readily to hand, but it did the job well enough ...
 
TonyV said:
I don't want that ever again, and I will write the TSO and tell them that. The music speaks for itself.
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I, and other n00bs, find the intro's by Tom and Bill to be very enlightening. Art is enriched by context.
 
I can understand them giving an introductory talk at a pops concert that attracts new listeners, or at a new creations concert where most people will never have heard the music before or even know much about the composer, but it does seem a bit odd to introduce Mahler and Britten that way.

Perhaps they could have saved the chit-chat for the intermission, or in the lobby before the performance - like the COC and National Ballet do at the City Room in the opera house. Some of the interviews that Bill Littler has done at Roy Thomson Hall, with soloists at intermission, have been quite informative and lighthearted fun.
 
I don't mind the chats from the stage per se, depending on who gives them, and this is no offence intended to Tom Allen at all, except that he talked far too much.

There was a bit of a personal irony going on there, though, I've got to add. Just that morning as I switched of CBC-2 on way to work, I was thinking that I was getting tired of it. I am not referring to the current situation with CBC dropping classical (a terrible thing that is happening) -- I am just sort of in the mood for "on to the next", done with Tom. His humour is good, but it contains the stereotypical just a bit too much for me. How to get on my bad side? Hint: dispense stereotypical humour.

So as I hit that radio button in the a.m. thinking "maybe it's bye, Tom", he showed up by surprise in person in the p.m.

But what the blazes else is there to listen to in the morning? Can't stand most of what's on the airwaves and face it, we're spoiled by the state-supported non-commercial CBC.

There's another thread topic: Toronto radio.

I do like jazz and I do like Jazz.Fm but Porter Air is a sponsor -- don't get me started.
 
Here are my next few concerts / operas:


Saturday, March 29, 2008 TSO Brahms 1st Piano Cto, Kissin, Davis

Thursday, April 3, 2008, TSO – Mahler 5th, Benjamin Zander conducting

Tuesday April 15, 2008, COC, Tchaikovsky, Eugene Onegin

Thursday, May 1, 2008, TSO, Tchaikovsky’s 4th Symphony, Klas conducting

Tuesday May 6, 2008, COC, Debussy, Pelleas et Melisande

Thursday May 8, TSO, Schubert 9th Symphony, Herbig

Tuesday May 13, 2008, COC, Rossini, Barber of Seville

Thursday May 29, 2008, TSO, All Brahms, Kovacevic, YNS conducting
 
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